Meet my husband Brian, I think I'll keep him :)

If you are still here, I say thank you for indulging me :) 

These next few posts are going to introduce y'all (yes, y'all is a legitimate word in the Texas dictionary) to the complex and crazy people I hold nearest and dearest to my heart. The first of course will be the hubs and immediate family, and depending on how long my writers block stays away, they'll most likely include grandparents, cousins, bro/sis-in-law and their minions, BFF's, college people, and maybe if you can put up with it, Bleu-dog. Hey he's a cool canine, don't judge. It's an animal-lover thing...

Aaaaaaand now about the snoring, farting  man I sleep next to every night, and gave me the chance to have a less complicated (apparently) last name...the hubs Brian, by default and just because he's pretty awesome, definitely makes the top of my favorite-people list. Native of the San Antonio area (mainly Fredericksburg), he stands at 6'4" with blonde hair and pretty blue yes...and a big goofy grin. If you've put two and two together, yes he is predominately of German heritage. Big guy's mother is a  successful CPA, and his dad is an engineer for the SA power company, so needless to say he is freakishly intelligent...it's also scary that he doesn't realize just HOW intelligent he is sometimes...really. I once came home after a shopping trip to find him with his laptop, and mine, linked and out on the coffee table frantically working with some sort of grid and his coding software program...I wasn't shocked, but I asked him what in the world he was doing? He got bored with the online sudoku (he calls them his 'dailies') games he had been playing, so he decided to hack into the site server, download the application, and make his own sudoku game. What was so funny is that he told me this in a manner of "What? This is a normal thing, like brushing your teeth!" after I blankly stared then rolled my eyes. Yes honey, every regular person is able to hack into a database and write their own software for a custom sudoku game...I'll get right on that...Another default factor is that he bleeds Texas A&M maroon. You want to talk about a family legacy, TAMU's engineering school should be named after his family. Great-grandparents, great-uncles, grandparents, parents (minus his mom who is a UT grad...boo...but she has pretty much morphed over to the good side of the force), uncles, cousins, and his brother Mike ALL were A&M graduates. Brian, however, graduated from UT Dallas (shameless plug #2: UTD is an ideal school for engineer/software goo-roo's/future doctors, lawyers, & therapist wannabes, very academically sound school, national recognitions for various programs, ect. ect....it was founded by Texas Instruments back in the 60's, so yeah, smart-kid school...www.utdallas.edu) with a Computer Science degree. Blacksheep of the family? Oh yeah...in more ways than one. His athletic loyalties still lie with TAMU..."BEAT THE HELL OUTTA TU! A-WHOOP!"A self-proclaimed nerd, Brian is an Adobe certified software developer for a Boston-based company here in the DFW area. Loves loves loves his job, he's in nerd heaven. And he gets to wear a t-shirt and jeans to work every day...so unfair...but he brings home the bacon and that's cool with me.I like bacon...with wheat toast and eggs over-medium please.

Brian and I met on Eharmony.com...yes it does work. I had joined the site just a couple weeks before Brian, and we were instantly matched with about a 92 compatibility (based on personality, morals, childhood backgrounds, hobbies/interests, values, financial standards, religion, politics, children, honesty, intelligence, pretty much all of it) percentile. Knowing myself inside and out, my first thought was "good Lord, if this guy is THAT compatible with me of all people, he must have balls of steel and a big heart."
Sure enough, my assumption was beyond 100% correct.
After being a serious relationship for 3+ years,
then having my heart broken by a bonafide,
self-absorbed jackhole (cheater cheater
pumpkin eater, liar liar pants on fire...
SOB was messing around with his lab
partner and best friend's ex-girlfriend-at the same time-while we were engaged and living together...yeah real winner, I was an idiot...
edge of a cliff), I was extremely cautious of
trusting someone again. We did the structured "guided communication" that EH offered, emailing and talking over the phone for a few weeks before meeting in person. Nervous before our first date? Uh, you could say that...prayed to the porcelain God a couple times, had to reapply deodorant every few minutes, and my co-worker offered me a shot of tequila before I had to leave. Turns out I was freaking out for nothing...I still give him a hard time for this, but when I arrived at the local bar for a few drinks, he shook my hand...shook, my friggin, hand...BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! At least he was respectful...*holding back laughter*...but the rest of the evening was beyond one of the most fun times I have ever had. It was like we had known each other for years: we talked about our polar opposite siblings, growing up with our crazy parents, friends, dogs (he's a dog lover too, instant cool points), our jobs (mainly the dumb kids and questions I get asked on a regular basis, he got a kick out of that...which will also be a later post), A&M football, baseball, wine, shared quirky jokes, traded high-school and college stories, and so much more. Originally, our date was only supposed to for a couple hours with a few drinks. We ended up having drinks, dinner, went out dancing, and stayed up till about 4 AM just talking. Unfortunately, that following Sunday I had to go out of town for work. The whole week I was gone, we talked on the phone for hours every single night. I couldn't wait to get back to him. Although the poor guy had a slip-up one night...he had attempted to say something along the lines of "you're so easy to talk to" and "you're the best girl I've ever met", but it ended up coming out as "you're the easiest girl I've ever talked to...wait a minute..." After pausing for a second to make sure he hadn't just called me a slut, I died with laughter. So much, that I started my infamous snort-laugh...yes, I'm a snorter...big guy was so relieved, and still claims to this day that he "fell in love with me that night, because I didn't hold back." All in all, he just seemed to "get" me, which is a big part of what why we were so good together. Turns out he was generally misunderstood as well. After that night, and a few more dates later, I prayed and prayed for some guidance and clarity on what I should do. All signs pointed to yes, and he was definitely the guy for me. Little less than a year later, he proposed, and we were married by the beach in Antigua (and later again at the Dallas county courthouse, funny story for later) with our families and an open-bar...score :)

For anyone who knows me best, they all can testify that it was going to take one hell of a guy to marry me. It wasn't a bad concept, but just for someone to fully understand "me" as a whole would be a magnificent feat. The fraternity I was a little sister for in college once kept a running tab on all the girls and who/what type of guy they would end up with...needless to say, they were always stumped when they got to me. I considered it a compliment to my uniqueness :) Hubs is a cool, simple guy that loves the essential 3 B's of all straight men: beer, beef, and boobs. He's definitely a man's-man, has balls of steel, kisses like its his job (OMG...), goofy and funny/weird/quirky as hell with some of the most out-there antics,
opinionated but knows when to shut his mouth,
drinks like a fish, loyal, listens, so loving,
bends over backwards, rarely has "spouse screw-ups",
unique, definitely his own person, loves me for me, builds me up, shows me that I can do more, shares my love for being easily entertained and sarcastic, and has the heart of a lion. I freely admit that I can be a hard pill to swallow for some people...but if I don't like you, I have legitimate reasons, and won't go out of my way to act all buddy-buddy. Just honest, blunt with a "big-picture" and logical point of view, and again generally misunderstood, that's all. Because of that, and also that without medicinal assistance I tend to be erratic/emotional/short-fused/manic/plain bat-sh*t crazy (I'd be a classic subject for a 'nature vs. nuture' study), I ask him how he puts up with me on a regular basis. His response? "You understand me, make me more human (his term for normal and less introverted), take care of me, and I love you...and your boobies" *sigh* What a guy, haha! (I've got D-cup front-tops, he's a big fan)

Forgive the cheese factor, but I honestly don't know how I lived without him. Granted he's deaf as a stump (he claims its because he can't hear me, but many can confirm that I am NOT a soft-spoken person, so I think it's selective listening and he just doesn't want to tell me...but I know the truth *wink*) and NEVER puts his dirty underwear in the hamper, picks up/throws away his beer cans and used tissues (he has terrible allergies w/constant congestion...its kinda gross), shuts cabinet doors, adjusts the thermostat (he would roast or freeze to death before he would notice and actually change the temperature), cleans out his car, listens to the GPS whenever we're lost, wears a different pair of jeans without me griping at him (wearing  the same pair of jeans for 5+ days at a time?? yuck...), turns the shower-nozzle completely on/off before he gets out (it's ALWAYS in the in-between part where a random half-gush of freezing cold water lands on my head and face when I'm still half-asleep...I am not a morning person...), opens mail, gets rid of t-shirts, or shaves, but I figure that if those are the worst things he does, then that's okay. He's the peanut butter to my jelly, the perfectly chilled chardonnay to my wine glass after a bad day, the missing randomly weird-shaped yet essential finishing piece to my puzzle, the punchline to my cheesy joke, my partner in crime, my rock, my best friend, my love, mine forever. Yep, I think I'll keep him.